Shambling Mound

Shamblers look like nothing more than piles of decaying plants, but they are intelligent vegetable beings with a rough humanoid outline. They stand six to nine feet tall, about six feet around at the base, from legs to waist, and tapering to about two feet at the 'head.'

Fearless and perhaps the deadliest plant known, a shambler swings two heavy armlike masses for 2-16 crushing damage each. A victim struck by both in one round is caught in slimy vines and rot, and suffocates in 2d4 rounds unless the mound dies first or the victim tears loose by making a bend bars/lift gates roll.

Its layered bulk makes it extraordinarily hard to hurt. Thick vegetation shields its vital core, giving it AC 0. Blades and points do only half damage, slowed by layer after layer of fiber and slime, and because it can collapse itself at will, blunt weapons do nothing. Fire is useless against its wet bulk. Cold deals half damage on a failed save and none on a success. Lightning makes it grow: each lightning attack adds one foot of height, 1 Hit Die and the matching hit points. Plant-affecting spells work normally, and plant control and charm plant have been the most effective.

Shamblers often lie in shallow bogs and wait for something to step on them, imposing -3 on surprise and frequently smothering victims before they can cry out. In their home terrain they are nearly silent and invisible (-3 to opponents' surprise rolls), they swim well, and they will creep slowly into a sleeping camp at night.

They need heavy rain and thick growth, favoring gloomy swamps, marshes and rain forests, though some live in damp underground places. Usually solitary, they share territory only where food is constantly available, such as near well-known ruins or abandoned gold mines.

The mound is an animated clump of plants steered by a small brainlike organ deep in its 'chest.' Cutting off the head does nothing, and severing a limb, merely a bundle of vines and moss, does not hinder it; loose vines on the torso knit into a new one by the next round. It dies only when enough of it has been hacked away. A wounded shambler simply withdraws into a thick tangle of wet growth and rises 12 hours later fully healed, and likely furious.

Since lightning feeds them, some suspect much larger shamblers exist. Will-o-wisps share their desolate haunts, so monsters of 20 or more Hit Dice may lurk in the most remote, lightless swamps and jungles.